below and the sides were wide open. there were several moems i don t know how close the tornado came but the rain was horizontal, the signs were blowing around and you could see tree limbs flying by. so it was pretty tense. i read there were as many as 1200 people in the airport at the time. does that seem right to you? that would be pretty close. that tunnel was pretty packed. the airport or the terminal area is open now. they haven t opened up the area to loading, of course, but we re in the ticket check area and the baggage check area now anyway. it s torrential downpour now. it hasn t stopped coming down for three hours now. actually, when we were out in the parking garage area coming up, it was all flooding in the first floor. are you trying to fly out of there? i m trying to get to new york city, which isn t going to happen. do you know what you re going to do? it seems like getting anywhere in oklahoma city right now, i mean, police are saying stay off
was already a much bigger storm. it was 130 mile mile per hour storm. what i would consider to be more of a dud. that s still pretty significant. an ef-5 which we saw 12, 14 almost two weeks ago, that was 200 miles an hour. so an ef-3, you think that was the biggest tornado that we saw tonight? well, here s the deal. we won t know that until we go out tomorrow. for a lot of the time, wolf, this was wrapped in rain. think about the tornado in the middle of a storm. but you can t see it. you can t get those pretty pictures because the rain was all the way around it. it was a ring around the tornado. so there s no definition for the
producing a tornado. that being across portions of arkansas. the lightning threat is there. the tremendous amount of rainfall that s come down, information out of st. louis, the mississippi river that flows through st. louis, the water levels are cresting and we expect them to crest at 41 feet high. that s the fourth highest level since 1785. that s about 200-plus years they ve kept data across the region. only three other times having seen data this high for water levels. it s remarkable because a few weeks ago, few months ago, we were talking about water shortage and water levels being so low in the area. it looks like the rain could continue and taper off here by the early portion of the weekend out there. guys? what a difference a few days makes. thanks, pedram. our continuing coverage continues after this. up next, we ll hear from a local congressman. he s going to tell us his reaction to this latest storm.
it went further east, it caused damage. we saw storm chasers and motorists that were thrown off the road. we went out and pulled them out of their vehicles. it was just a disaster, very violent tornado. today was one of those days where you knew there were going to be strong tornadoes. they just seemed to keep hitting oklahoma. a really eerie part of today was when we were chasing that weak rain wrapped tornado. thankfully, this weakended as it moved through south oklahoma city. we went through damage path of the ef-5 tornado just, what, seven to ten days ago. i live actually two to three miles south of that damage path. our thoughts and prayers definitely go out to the people here in oklahoma city and south oklahoma city and moore. because it s going to take years to rebuild. it looks like a war zone up there still. a tornado took a hard turn. you can see how volatile the
funnel clouds ripped up houses, threw cars and trucks from the road throughout the evening. more than 50,000 homes and businesses there are without power around oklahoma city alone. authorities are now concerned about the flooding. now, friday was a bad day for oklahoma. but not as bad as may 20th when an ef-5 tornado devastated the oklahoma city suburb of moore. a few hours ago, wolf blitzer spoke with oklahoma congressman tom cole. caller: well, power is gone, immediately, phones, everything like that. literally torrential rain. i ve been in touch with people by blackberry and cell phone. they were keeping me warned. we had a tornado immediately to the north of here along i-40. another one south of here toward the norman area, and then a third evidently east of here. not obviously as severe as we